Beast of the Bivouac: Arocs 8x8 at Dakar 2020 🚚

The Arocs also took part in one of the toughest rallies in the world, but it wasn’t in the actual competition. Its job: recovering stranded vehicles.

During the stages between the bivouacs – the overnight camps in the desert – the Arocs freed more than 100 stranded vehicles. The all-terrain Arocs 8x8 quickly earned its nickname: “Beast of the bivouac”. Even on the hardest terrain, the truck cut a fine figure with its power, robustness and efficiency. Here the team could above all profit from its Turbo Retarder Clutch. The system makes it possible to set off wear-free at full torque and delicately maneuvers the truck without overheating the clutch – perfect for deployment in desert sand, which the Arocs and team managed without breaking down once.

From a basic camper van to a heavy truck, it helped free everyone that got bogged down. Sometimes the vehicles had sunk 20 centimeters down into the sand, and trailers with dozens of spare tyres were just as stuck as smaller, less off-road-savvy service vehicles. The softer the sand, the more the Arocs was in demand, sometimes dozens of times in the span of just a few hours.